Over the course of the past week I have spent a lot of time in deep prayer and meditation about decisions in my life that needed to be made - while seeking answers to those questions, as the Lord has a way of doing, He brought forth other aspects of my life that in a round about way were directly related and which answered all of my questions with one big question from the Him(funny how He still does that - answers our questions with questions of His own).
'What are you seeking'? Funny - seems like a fairly broad question...and yet it is so specific. What am I seeking - what is the goal - what is the final destination? I have realized this week that in the Christian life, there are pretty much 2 options...we can accept Christ and do our best to live a good life, accepting His grace and mercy and trying our hardest to stay out of trouble while serving our fellow brothers and sisters however we feel we are equipped to do so or we can dig in, devote our entire beings and follow hard after God with strict determination and conviction to be more holy, more Christ like with every passing day regardless of the consequences. While there is nothing necessarily wrong with the former (it by no means makes that Christian any less loved or saved by Christ's sacrifice) the latter, I believe, leads to a life as God intended it to be, full of intimacy and experiences only available to those who are truly willing to seek Him with a reckless abandon of their own selves. The question posed to me this week was, in a nutshell, which do I desire for myself?
"I don't want to suggest that becoming like Christ will be easy. Seeking intimacy with the Almighty requires focused determination, demands specific changes in attitude and behavior, and will come with a number of heartbreak and setbacks."
~~So You Want To Be Like Christ - Charles Swindol~~
Focus? Determination? Heartbreak? Yes - that's it. Becoming more like Christ and receiving the blessings that come with that requires a person to set out with the specific purpose of doing so and then the determination to persevere through the pain and trials that are going to come with the journey. Being holy and more Christ like does not just fall into our laps...it is not something that certain people are blessed with or something that just 'happens' after you've put in enough time. It is a desire of the heart, it is sought after and it is earned. The first step is to decide 'what are you seeking'? If the desire is to be more like Christ, then the commitment to train spiritually must follow. With that training comes the sacrifice of all that is in our flesh. It is not a/b me, nor my desires. It is not a/b the desires of those around me, what makes them happy or content - it is not about what I think is right - it is only about Him and what He deems as right and holy. What a HUGE concept! To take every thought, every desire and to present it to God Himself, in all of His glory, and ask Father, is this Your desire??
I have decided this week that my desire is to place God before everything else in my life. To be in accordance to His will for me - to be sensitive to what He wants in my life and to lay down my fleshly wants and needs in order to walk according to His. A commitment? Sure. A sacrifice? Definitely. But both necessary if the goal is being holy and godly and more like Christ. This week I have found that it is my desire to seek purposefully, intently and whole heartedly after God. I am no longer able to rest in my salvation, I want more - more of whatever it is that He has to offer, whatever it is that He has to give me...I want it. And in that realization I received my answers to the questions I originally sought prayer for - again, funny how He manages to do that.
So, in conclusion, I ask you the same question the Lord has asked me...what exactly are you seeking? And what are you willing to do to get there?
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